


The Nice and Accurate Musings of Anthony J. Crowley

by Elleberquist6



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Crowley Loves Aziraphale (Good Omens), Friends to Lovers, M/M, Muses, Oblivious Aziraphale (Good Omens), Other, Pride and Prejudice References, References to Ancient Greek Religion & Lore, References to Shakespeare, Wooing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-20
Updated: 2020-12-20
Packaged: 2021-03-10 23:29:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,910
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28185423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elleberquist6/pseuds/Elleberquist6
Summary: Unbeknownst to Aziraphale, Crowley played a role in the creation of some of the books in his shop which he treasures. Ever since he helped "Hamlet" to be successful, Crowley has been making contributions to classic literature -- to please Aziraphale, to tease him, and to confess his feelings. Aziraphale reads then all, seemingly oblivious to the hidden messages within the books from Crowley, who gets increasingly frustrated.
Relationships: Aziraphale & Crowley (Good Omens), Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 34





	The Nice and Accurate Musings of Anthony J. Crowley

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Stardust_Ti](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stardust_Ti/gifts).



> Happy belated birthday, Stardust_Ti! I hope you enjoy :)

As with everything, it all began with William Shakespeare. Well, that’s not to say that literally _everything_ began with him, but lots of good stuff did. Like just look at the words he invented: dwindle, critic, bandit, dauntless, lackluster, lonely, swagger, unaware, uncomfortable, undress, unearthly, unreal. Hmmm, he was a big fan of ‘un’s apparently… But just look at the rest! Take swagger for example, that one is from _Midsummer Night’s Dream._ Where would we be without swagger? I wouldn’t have a word to describe how I walk into a room for instance. Ol’ Bill did us a solid by thinking that one up.  
But I digress, let’s swagger back to the topic at hand. It all began with William Shakespeare. And by _it_ I mean that’s where this story began. 1609 A.D. London, England. In the Globe Theater. While in the audience for an early showing of _Hamlet_ , a certain someone asked me “What do you want?” and then I told him. I was going to be in Edinburgh by the end of a week to tempt a clan leader to steal cattle. He was also going to be there to perform a minor miracle, and there was no sense in us both going all the way to Scotland, especially by horse. This was the start of our arrangement.  
But it was also the start of another arrangement, one which my angel isn’t aware of yet. Well, not exactly. He knows about that first time. He was there after all. He watched me do it. I did it for him. Well, he didn’t _exactly_ watch me do it. In fact, I was the one who was watching him in the moment that I decided to do it, as William Shakespeare declared “It’d take a miracle to get anyone to come and see _Hamlet_ ,” and I watched as my poor angel’s face fell as he heard those words. He loved the play we were watching.

I couldn’t bear to see that look on his face. So, I whispered to him, “Yes, alright. I’ll do that one. My treat.”  
The light that sprang to his blue eyes made all the work that followed worth it. You see some miracles, such as for example helping a play to not flop, take a bit more than a snap of the fingers. For a start, that bloody soliloquy we were listening to was godawful at first. Wait no! No, you know what I meant. Satanawful. But just listen to this: “To be, or not to be; ay, there's the point. / To die, to sleep—is that all? Ay, all. / No, to sleep, to dream—ay, marry, there it goes.”

Seriously, that was it. And that wouldn’t do for _Hamlet_. The Bard needed my help.

Now, the first thing I had to do was rationalize this to myself. It isn’t that easy for a respectable demon such as myself to suddenly start doing miracles. I’m not nice, I’m a demon. But to see him smile when the play is a success…? That would be worth it.

I had to step into the role that some would acquaint with a guardian angel. I stood behind Will’s shoulder as he scribed, invisible to the eye, and whispered revisions to _Hamlet_ into his ear. But no, I won’t be compared to a guardian angel, even if I did also spread the word at the local pubs that there would be a free beer at the next showing, ensuring that _Hamlet_ sold out and became a smashing success. No, because I am not an angel. Not anymore. Not since I sauntered vaguely downwards…

No, in these moments where I whispered ideas to him as he wrote, I thought of myself more as a muse, like the daughters of Zeus from Greek mythology: Thalia the Muse of comedy; Melpomene the Muse of tragedy; Cleo the Muse of history; Euterpe the Muse of lyric poetry; Terpsichore the Muse of music and dancing; Erato the Muse of erotic poetry; Calliope the Muse of epic poetry and rhetoric; Urania the Muse of astronomy; and Polyhymnia the Muse of sacred hymns and harmony.

For this task of inspiring Shakespeare to revise _Hamlet_ , I put my best Melpomene tragic mask on my face, picked up the club of Hercules, and draped myself in a wreath of vines or leaves. And… all of this sounds like I’m talking rubbish if you don’t know the muses, but trust me, Melpomene loves this stuff. She’s all about those accessories, and Melpomene also loves a good tragedy. I don’t. I prefer Shakespeare’s funny ones. But _Hamlet_ was a tragedy, so Melpomene I must be.

It worked. The play was a success, just as I promised my angel it would be. Once he returned from Scotland, it was the talk of London. Even in those early days, they were calling it his greatest work… not that that would have been what the playwright himself wanted to hear, when he had no plans of retiring from his career.

But to the playwright’s muse, those words were music to the ears, and I smiled my smuggest smile at my angel when I brought him to see the play in all its revised glory. I don’t think he noticed my smile. He was too captivated by the play playing out before us on the stage. And then suddenly before I knew it _I,_ myself, was suddenly the one who was captive. Because _he_ was happy because of something I had done. He loved it. His face was shining. And I needed more of that glow. I needed to do more for him.

This isn’t as easy to accomplish as it might sound, believe me. I was a demon who wanted to do a good deed for a friend. But demons don’t just go around doing nice things. I’m not nice, as I said before. The _Hamlet_ thing was a one-off thing, it was just my part of a bargain… even though technically I threw it in as a treat. But no, it was a deal. No special favors. I couldn’t do it again, no matter how wonderful it had been to see him happy.

But… I soon convinced myself, working with the Bard had been entertaining, and it couldn’t hurt to muse for him again. Besides, I reasoned with myself, I would be doing it for myself this time. I always preferred Shakespeare’s funny ones and this next time I would help him to write a comedy. If my angel laughed while watching it too, well then that would just be a bonus.  
Once more, I donned the muse-ly place at the Bard’s shoulder as he lounged at his writer’s desk. Only this time, I was Melpomene’s sister, Thalia, holding a comic mask, a shepherd’s crook, and a wreath of ivy, while I whispered witty puns, irony, and playful word play into his play – another of his best, if I do say so myself – _Much Ado About Nothing._  
As soon as it premiered, I saw this one with my angel as well, although I must admit that I watched him more than I did the play. Now, I know how that sounds. But don’t jump to assumptions. This wasn’t all about savoring the sight of his smile, as I had expected it to be, or even his laughter, though there was quite a bit of that. No, this time, I started to sweat it. I hadn’t realized how much of myself… of us… I had whispered into the play.  
Beatrice. Benedick. They were us.  
Stupid, _stupid_ demon. I had done too much. And he would see it. Clearly, the play starred us. He was going to notice. He would figure it out. And then he would turn to me and say, “Aw, that was so nice of you.” Then I would have to remind him that I’m not nice.  
Briefly, I debated burning down the Globe Theater, mid performance. That’s what Haster would do. Destroy all the evidence. Perhaps he had the right idea. Just as I was scanning the room for a conveniently placed candlestick, I realized the play had gone on for too long. Beatrice and Benedick had met and exchanged witty retorts. But of course, they had not met for the first time.

Unlike many other potential lovers in Shakespeare’s plays, these two had a long history together. They met many, many years before when Beatrice naively fell for him; however, Benedick was a man of duty whose loyalty was to his brothers in arms first, so he left with them, completely oblivious to the fact that he left her smarting with the pang of his loss. Fiery Beatrice, not the type to moon after this man, instead became his mortal enemy and started sending him scornful letters.

Benedict was provoked by the letters and wrote back, also embracing the fact that he had in her a mortal enemy. And this began their history. Over the years, they met again and again, bringing their waspish interactions outside of the page to the present, where they could fire off clever insults at each other. It was obvious to everyone around them that they had fallen in love. Then one day, once Benedick’s duties to his brothers in arms were done, he… well, I won’t give away the ending here.  
Speaking of the ending, that day in the Globe, I was sweating like I had just taken a trip downstairs. It was too late to burn down the house, which at best would just briefly discorporate us. He had seen too much, and all I could do was stand there as I waited for his reaction. And yet… none came. Well, he reacted the way he would at the end of any play. He clapped, he cheered, and he cried “Author!” until the playwright stepped onto the stage for a bow. None of this was directed at me, as I’d expected it to be once he figured out my role in this production.

Because he was oblivious. And that… well, let’s just say I wasn’t happy about that.

How could he not notice that that was us playing out on the stage?! The only way that it could have been more obvious was if Benedick and Beatrice had wings. As emotions roiled within me, uncertain if they wanted to settle on hurt, anger, or a mixture of the two, while I had to keep a neutral smile on my face. The crowd was filing out of the Globe, and he was stealing glances at my face, obviously trying to gauge my reaction.

“That was great, wasn’t it?” he coaxed. “Lots of jokes, right up to the part with all the drama. And you always like the funny ones.”

“Hilarious,” I said in deadpan, making sure my sunglasses were in place as we stepped into the crowded streets.

“That’s odd, I didn’t hear you laughing,” he said. My angel had to raise his voice to be heard over the ruckus of Londoners outside who were hocking wares, corralling animals in the market for sale, and children were shrieking excitedly as they chased each other down the road. 

“I was laughing on the inside,” I said in morose dismissal.

He was openly staring at me at this point, while I could only glance at him, but somehow, we understood each other. I had barely made sense of my own emotions – that odd sense of betrayal mixed with anger, disappointment, and sadness – but he knew how I was feeling, even if he didn’t know why I was feeling it. And that was enough for him, since he could also tell that I didn’t want to talk about it. “Let’s grab a bite to eat,” he suggested.

“Love to.”

“Daniel Defoe is a genius,” my angel raved.

“Who?” I said around a mouthful of biscuit which I had dipped in pub stew. We had unanimously agreed that while the establishment was a bit too loud, it had the best biscuits in London which made up for that.

“ _Daniel Defoe!_ ” he whined. “I’ve been talking about him for months. Haven’t you been listening?”

“Of course, of course. Good ol’ Daniel. He’s real smart. He’s a… great writer,” I grumbled a guess. I could tell by the contented look on the angel’s face that I had guessed correctly. It’s not surprising. He can go on about books so much that I just start to glaze over sometimes. I can’t help it.

“He really is,” my angel gushed. “I just finished _Robinson Crusoe_ and I can’t stop thinking about it. The metaphors alone… The more I reflect on it, I’m sure that Defoe intended the island to symbolize the Garden. Do you remember the Garden?”  
“Hmm?” That shook me out of my book-induced stupor. “Eden? Of course, I do.” I let my half-eaten biscuit fall into the broth, overcome suddenly by a memory I had of the man seated across the table from me. I had seen him around the Garden before just in passing as I slithered along, but my most vivid memory of those early days was the first time I ever spoke to him atop the wall, as we watched Adam and Eve depart. It rained that day, the first rainfall ever, and yet I wouldn’t have changed a thing about that moment.  
“There were goats,” he said.

“Pardon me?”

“In the Garden of Eden. Remember? There were goats,” he insisted. “Just like the goats that Robinson Crusoe tends to in Defoe’s book.”

“Oh. Now that you mention it, I guess there were,” I said noncommittally, not having any strong feelings on goats, be they fictional or biblical. Then I noticed that my angel was sipping from a glass of merlot, and I figured I should get in a word before he said anything else about this book that, mind you, he had been talking about nonstop for days already. I’m not exaggerating. Taking advantage of his momentary silence, I blurted, “Oh! I just remembered I wanted to tell you something.”

“Hmm?” he lowered his glass and looked at me expectantly.

“You know how we’ve been meaning to see _Rinaldo?_ It’s not just Handel's first opera for the London stage, but also the first all-Italian opera performed there – it’s been 8 years and we haven’t seen it yet. That’s a travesty. So, how does this week sound?”  
His eyes dropped to the tabletop. “Oh, um, that sounds lovely. But maybe next week?”

I blinked. He almost never turned down a suggestion like this. “You have something else scheduled? Good to do, miracles to perform?”

He shook his head, which I had suspected. If it was angel business, I would probably already be aware of it. He said, “I was actually planning to reread _Robinson Crusoe_ this week, until I’ve memorized it and puzzled out all its meaning and mysteries.”

“But what about _Rinaldo?_ ” I asked, though what I really meant was ‘what about me?’. It might sound selfish, but he had never chosen a reading a book over spending time with me before. At least that I was aware of…  
My angel shrugged. “ _Rinaldo_ has been on the stage for 8 years, like you said. Its not going anywhere.”

“Okay, next week then,” I replied. I wanted to say, ‘And I suppose I’ve also been here for years, so you assume I’m not going anywhere either?’ but I quelled my rage. Because the truth to that question was yes – for both of us. I wasn’t going anywhere, and neither was he, so there was no reason to rage at him. Jealousy on the other hand… well, that emotion wasn’t so easily dispelled. As I stabbed at my stew, I plotted my revenge on Daniel Defoe.

It had been just over 100 years since I had last acted as a muse for William Shakespeare. Since then, I had had approximately 30,000 bites to eat with my angel, during the majority of which he mentioned some author or another. None of those mentions had triggered me to get some form of vengeance on an author before, so I couldn’t put my finger on why this time was different from the rest. Maybe I was just bored. But something had spurred me to action, some sort of undefined catalyst… I was a mixture of aluminum and silicon dioxide, undergoing catalytic cracking, and my thoughts were floating up like small hydrocarbons.  
As I reflected on those hydrocarbons where they pertained to Daniel Defoe, I realized that I had a revenge plot. It just wasn’t the one I’d expected initially when I was sitting at lunch with my angel, which had mostly involved mildly demonic things such as moving things out of place in his home, spoiling the food in his house, or causing his correspondence in the mail to get lost. But as a solid plan started to form, I realized that I was going to take a different path in my vengeance. I would become a muse once more. I hadn’t had any desire to be one in a hundred years, but suddenly it sounded like fun again. Not that a hundred years ago felt like a long time to me, more like last week. Now suddenly this week, I felt like musing again.  
Also, it just so happened that my two desires coincided. I could satisfy this urge I had to be a muse once more at the same time as I got my revenge. Although, revenge might be a bit of an extreme word for what I had in mind. What I was plotting was more like a cheeky surprise for both author and reader. Defoe’s first work, _Robinson Crusoe_ , had already been a shock to its audience as it defined a new genre. There had never been anything like it in English literature before, so much so that when inventing it Defoe had to mimic another. _Robinson Crusoe_ , the first fictional novel, was written as if it was a self-authored biography of a castaway on an island who had to survive, create his own society, and ultimately escape the island with a native he befriended. It was at its heart a story about a man who persevered by staying true to himself, never losing his faith and hope, and exerted a stubborn influence on the world around him to shape it into his vision.  
Pondering how to make my angel say “Oh my…” while turning the pages of the next Defoe book, I couldn’t imagine anything more satisfying than inspiring Defoe to write the polar opposite of his previous character. Give them a heroine when they are expecting a hero. Someone who was true to herself to a fault, when it wouldn’t hurt her to maybe learn a lesson from her experiences. Someone who was stubborn to the point of being unapologetic. Even as she claimed to have grown toward the end, it would be impossible tell if she was just being manipulative for sympathy.  
Yet despite all this, she was the sort of character the reader would want to find her happiness because the world had dealt her a rough hand. She never gave up. She always kept trying her best, even when it seemed like everyone was against her. At times, she’d be just as isolated as Robinson Crusoe on his island, even when walking through a city full of people – a feeling I was familiar with. But there was one person she had sometimes though, someone who she kept meeting again and again over the years, as if fate were drawing them together.  
Moll Flanders. I liked her already.

While my angel was busy spending the week rereading _Robinson Crusoe_ instead of going to see Handel with me, I paid a visit to Daniel Defoe in his London home. First, I contended the green monster within me by turning the loaves of bread within his kitchen pantry blue. Then I took my place invisibly behind the author’s desk as he scribbled on parchment and whispered into his ear to guide his hand. This time I was Erato, the sister muse who carries a lyre and wears a wreath that is made from myrtle and roses.

As Erato, I inspired Defoe to fill the novel of _Moll Flanders_ with as many… let’s just call them “oh my” moments as I could convince the author to write. Surely enough to make the angel blush the entire time he read it. The best that I could hope for was that I would be there to see it when he read it and squirmed. Or at least that he would shyly splutter when he told me about the book after he read it. If he did, that would present its own challenge – how would I keep a straight face?

I was never one to back down from a trial though… and in that moment I decided that yes, I would meet this challenge. It wasn’t fair to make my angel squirm, if I wasn’t in the same position. He would tell me about the work I had inspired as a muse, and my task would be to not give away that I had helped to create it, no matter what he said about it. Even if it made him blush, no, I would not reveal that I was behind _Moll Flanders_. Or any other work that was to follow because I could see myself doing this again in the future.

Briefly, I considered the efficacy of what I was doing. Thinking more on it though from the angel’s point of view, I knew he would say that the more books there are in the world, the better. So, I didn’t hold back. I whispered the most scandalous novel I could imagine into Daniel Defoe’s ear, and he wrote down every word.

Moll Flanders. Born in Newgate prison to a convicted thief. After being seduced and spurned at a young age by her first love, she is determined to marry to escape a life of servitude. Her first husband dies shortly thereafter. Her second husband parts amicably with her, when he must flee debts before they even have time to file for legal divorce. She gets along with her third husband, but unfortunately he turns out to be her half-brother, so she leaves him. The fourth husband loves her, and she loves him in return, but he has no way to support her so they part ways until he can. Her fifth husband dies, leaving her destitute. In a desperate situation with no other way to provide for herself, she is convinced to steal by her landlady. Just as it seems like fate has dealt her the worst blow and she’s arrested, she’s reunited in prison with her fourth husband, who convinces her that it might not be too late to turn things around now that they are together.

And there. That should be enough to make my angel blush. Just picturing it made me laugh. I gave Defoe one last nudge, convincing him to rush the manuscript to his publisher as soon as possible. I couldn’t wait to see my angel’s rosy cheeks.

As it turned out, I would be waiting a long time. Not for the book to be published, that is. It came out only 3 short years after _Robinson Crusoe_. That blush is what I would be waiting for. My angel bought it on the first day it hit the shops and finished it on the same. I spent the day with him while he read, stealing glances at his impassive face. When he was done, I asked him as casually as I could, “Well? What did you think?”

He closed the book and stared pensively at the cover for a moment before concluding, “I think that Defoe was going for a Mary Magdalene allegory with this story. He was trying to show us that we shouldn’t judge those who have fallen without knowing the full story behind how they fell. The road they walked might have been long and hard, and they might be trying to find there way back from this path.”  
“Well…” I considered that and had to shrug. “As someone who has fallen without meaning to, I appreciate that sentiment. Not that falling is that bad.” Then I shot him a suspicious glance, convinced he was messing with me. “Is that really what you took away from that book?”  
“What was I supposed to take away from it?” He blinked. “And what do you know about the book? Did you read it too?”

“Me? Read it? You know that’s not my thing.” I spluttered and shrugged. “I may have just skimmed it. I was just saying, Mary Magdalene wouldn’t have been what I took away from it. How about the husbands? The bigamy? The incest? None of that stuck with you?”

He also shrugged but was staring at me now intently. “Yes, I noticed the husbands, the bigamy, and the incest. Why do you ask?”

“No reason.” I gave him my biggest shrug yet, as if I could lift the weight of the suspicion I felt falling on me with my back. I wouldn’t speak another word about _Moll Flanders_ while he was looking at me like that and it felt like he was close to figuring me out. But I was already planning my next move.  
It remained a mystery to me why my collaboration with Daniel Defoe failed to make the angel squirm. The rest of the world seemed to find it sufficiently scandalous. About a hundred and fifty years after it was published, _Moll Flanders_ was briefly banned under the grounds that it was obscene, and it could only be found in back-alley shops that sold sex toys and other adult literature. Hearing that gave me some satisfaction that I had accomplished some of what I had set out to do with that book, and yet made it all the odder that I couldn’t make him blush.  
Or rather, I had just failed to make him blush this time. I would have to try again. It was then that I realized how much I really wanted to try again. I had truly come to love creating these works that he would read, and I needed to do it again. The ideas of novels were buzzing inside me like a swarm of bees, and I needed to let them loose so they could fly into the world and pollinate blank pages with my thoughts which would bloom into books. Books that he would then treasure.  
Right before the end of the 18th century, I whispered my ideas into the ear of novelist Jane Austen next, inspiring her to pen _Pride and Prejudice,_ opening it with the sarcastic line, “It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife _._ ” He would love that one. It might make him laugh from the first line.  
As the book progressed, I put more and more of myself into Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy, the misunderstood ‘bad guy’ with good intentions. I couldn’t help drawing some comparisons to my angel as well in the stubborn Lizzy Bennet, who was occasionally solitary, usually with her nose in a book. Lizzy and Darcy came from two different worlds, yet despite his best efforts and better judgement he felt drawn to her… and unfortunately the dolt used those exact words in his proposal. Yeah, that didn’t go well for him. He was an idiot sometimes, but a persistent one. He opened up to her. He showed her the better side of himself that he usually kept hidden from others, and he took another chance to see if she would now have him.  
I wondered how many times I would have to try, to see if he would have me… It was around the time of the release of this book that I stopped asking for his reaction to the creations I inspired in authors; he had been far too suspicious last time when I did so. Instead, I watched the books appear on his shelf with contended satisfaction. Knowing that he read my words was reward enough, and if he mentioned them in passing then that was just a bonus.

Next through the scrawlings of a retired sailor, Herman Melville, I told my angel the story of Ishmael in _Moby Dick._ I felt some kinship with this author upon first meeting him, when I took a peek at his private correspondence to another author, Nathaniel Hawthorne. I do not know if Nathaniel returned his sentiment, but I hoped he did as I read from Melville’s letter: “Whence come you, Hawthorne? By what right do you drink from my flagon of life? And when I put it to my lips – lo, they are yours and not mine…But I felt pantheistic then – your heart beat in my ribs and mine in yours, and both in God’s.”

This… this was the hand. By this hand, I could express my words to the angel. And so I whispered, and he wrote. Melville penned my tale of young Ishmael who walked into Spouter-Inn and stepped into his destiny, as he met Queequeg, a harpooner from the _Pequod._ Much like myself the first moment I saw my angel, Queequeg knew it the moment he saw Ishmael, “Queequeg seemed to take to me quite as naturally and unbiddenly as I to him; and when our smoke was over, he pressed his forehead against mine, clasped me round the waist, and said that henceforth we were married; meaning…we were bosom friends.”

The pair shared a bed in Spouter-Inn that night, and Ishmael said, “There is no place like a bed for confidential disclosures between friends. Man and wife, they say, there open the very bottom of their souls to each other; and some old couples often lie and chat over old times till nearly morning. Thus, then, in our hearts’ honeymoon, lay I and Queequeg—a cosy, loving pair.” Honestly, even as I whispered the words to the author to scribe, I was a bit envious of Ishmael and Queequeg in their cozy bed. I wanted to be laying beside my other half in that moment.

But I consoled myself. Perhaps someday I would lay beside him in our cozy bed as he read _Moby Dick._ And then this would all have been worth it. So, I continued dictating.

Nearly a hundred years later, I was inspired once more by author Zora Neale Hurston – the realism, the optimism, the symbolism with which she viewed love. I had to be a part of her work. She was already writing _Their Eyes Were Watching God_ when I met her, and I marveled at her words, “Janie was stretched on her back beneath the pear tree soaking in the alto chant of the visiting bees, the gold of the sun and the panting breath of the breeze when the inaudible voice of it all came to her. She saw a dust-bearing bee sink into the sanctum of a bloom; the thousand sister-calyxes arch to meet the love embrace and the ecstatic shiver of the tree from root to tiniest branch creaming in every blossom and frothing with delight. So this was a marriage! She had been summoned to behold a revelation.”

All I wanted to do was make a contribution to her book, to offer some small piece to what she was crafting. So, I whispered into her ear about a love that takes patience. It might take years of waiting for the right time, but it would be worth it in the end. Hurston wrote, and Janie waited. It took so long that all the buds on her tree closed, keeping out the bees. But eventually, he came. Tea Cake was as sweet as his name, and his smile opened the petals once more.

I could be patient too. His smile made it worth it.

As soon as I realized that everything had been reset after the end of the world, I drove my newly-revived Bentley to the only place I wanted to be – my angel’s bookshop. Assuming it was there. I guessed it might be since my car was back. I hoped it would be, for his sake. And perhaps for the books’ sake as well…

With relief, I spotted his bookshop on the corner as I rolled up and parked nearby. It looked just as I remembered it before yesterday. Well, today technically. Well, it felt like yesterday to me, but most of the world remembered it as the same day. Rebooted universes are tricky that way. Shaking off the paradox, I focused on what was important in this moment. _He_ was in that shop right now. My heart fluttered.  
It kept on beating funny the whole time I walked up to the shop, even as I got distracted by how miraculously immaculate the shop. The windows that were shattered the last time I saw them didn’t have a scratch. I sniffed the doorway as I passed through it, half expecting to smell scorched wood, but no. I only smelled the usual odors of the book shop – beeswax candles, musty books, and dust. There was no sign at all of the fire, but still I was skeptical of this replica of the book shop. Restoring my Bentley down to the complete contents of the glovebox is one thing, but was everything in the angel’s shop complete? Every page in each book down to the letter? I wasn’t sure if the antichrist could pull that off, so I kept glancing around. My angel wasn’t in sight, though I was sure he was nearby, likely in the back of the shop.

Before heading to the back to see him, my curiosity got the better of me. I paused to peruse a shelf. I wanted to see if the books were intact. My fingertips traced over the spines of books as I read the gold embossed letters, looking for a book which was familiar. One shelf in particular drew my attention. I wasn’t a reader, so the only books I knew well were the ones I’d assisted with as a muse. I had never noticed this shelf in the angel’s shop before, but now that I was looking for a book I knew, I realized that here they were, gathered all on one shelf together – every book that I had worked on for him. That seemed like an extraordinary coincidence.  
“Admiring your work?”

I whirled around to see him standing in the doorway to the back room, smiling at me with a mischievous glint in his eyes. “I was just seeing if they were all here.” Then, as I processed is question, quickly gestured around to the shop. “Are they all back after the fire?”

“Yes, they’re all back, with a few additions to boot.” He glanced at a collection of books gathered between two book ends atop a desk – the _Just William_ series by Richmal Crompton. Then his gaze flicked back to me, and a little bit over my shoulder as well at the shelf filled with my creations. “You didn’t answer my question. Were you admiring your work?”

I swallowed heavily and stared idly at the dust moats floating in the afternoon light that was flooding in through the shop’s windows. I commented carelessly, “You’re oddly direct after the end of the world…”

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw him shrug. He said, “If there ever was a time to be direct, I think it would be now. As you said, it’s a new world after what happened yesterday. It’s a second chance to mention things I should have said a long time ago. And for people to say things that maybe they want to say.”

He had a good point… so I met his gaze. “Well then… yes, I was admiring my work.” And there it was. Out in the open between us at last. I asked, “How long have you known?”

He smiled. “I’ve suspected for a long time. They sounded like you, I don’t know how else to explain it. Reading them felt like having a conversation with you.”

“I wrote them like I was having a conversation with you.”

“There’s one thing I’ve never been able to figure out,” he said. “How did you get so many authors to publish your works? Did you pay the authors to publish your writing under their names?”

“No, actually. I persuaded them to write it without ever knowing I was there,” I told him smugly. “Like how you spoke to me when you were inconveniently discorporated, I spoke to them and made suggestions. I’ve found that authors are strangely open to that sort of thing. It’s like they are straining to listen to the universe when they write, as if the universe will offer them some ideas.”

“Like they’re listening to the voice of God as they write,” he commented.  
I shrugged demonically, unwilling to submit to that comparison. “Yeah, well at the time I thought of it more as the voice of a muse. The Greek ones. So, I became muses for these authors. I spoke, and they listened to me. So, the books aren’t totally mine, more of a collaboration.”

He stepped closer and reached out. I expected him to touch me, but instead he stroked the spines of the books on my shelf in his shop. Then he gave me a smile that set his blue eyes sparkling and my heart fluttering. “Thank you. For all of them. I should have said that a long time ago, as soon as I knew it was you.”  
I shrugged. It was true that a long time ago “thank you” might have been what I wanted to hear from him after one of the early works, but it wasn’t anymore. I told him, “You don’t need to say that. That wasn’t why I wrote them, and of all the things we should have said to each other a long time ago, thanks is the least of them.”  
He shifted in place, as if his jacket were too snug across his shoulders, and his Adam’s apple quivered in his throat. My angel gave an awkward smile and nodded at the books. “I, um, have a lot to say about those, now that I know there yours. There’s so much to analyze there and having the author to ask about them is always a treat. Let me tell you some of my favorite lines.”  
I resisted rolling my eyes at the change of subject. If we started talking books now, it might be days before I could get him off the subject and back onto the topic I’d just tentatively approached. Yet I relented and said, “Sure, what lines?”  
He tapped _Their Eyes Were Watching God_ and quoted, “Love is like the sea. It's a moving thing, but still and all, it takes its shape from the shore it meets, and it’s different with every shore… Janie looked down on him and felt a self-crushing love. So her soul crawled out from its hiding place.”  
If the previous flutter my heart gave was like the shifting of someone does in their sleep, then this time my heart gave a jerk like the sleeper had been startled awake. I replied, quoting _Much Ado About Nothing,_ “I love you with so much of my heart that none is left to protest… I do love nothing in the world so well as you- is not that strange?”

“You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you,” he said, quoting Mr. Darcy from _Pride and Prejudice._  
“I will certainly allow it,” I said, giving up all pretense of quoting books.  
His cheeks filled with a crimson blush, the very shade of which I had imagined all those years ago when I vowed to make him blush someday. He stammered, “Tea. Um, tea. How about we talk about that over tea?”  
I laughed. “Sure, that sounds nice.  
After he got a steaming cup for each of us and we settled into the chairs by the gramophone in his shop, he said, “You know the thing that surprised me the most about reading these works? It was finding out that all the times you claimed books aren’t your thing that you weren’t telling the truth.”  
“Mmmh,” I shook my head as I swallowed a sip of tea. “No, I standby my statement that books aren’t my thing. Really, they aren’t. I don’t like reading. I just happened to discover that I like contributing to the writing process. But I’m not a reader.”  
“Not a reader, hmm?” he mused, as he stared into his cup, looking like he was trying to read the leaves before the cup was drained. “How about if I read to you? Would you like that?”  
“I’d love that,” I said, struck by that image I had years ago of being cuddled beside him as he read my books. Now I amended that fantasy to include him reading aloud. It was so much better, and very close to being reality any moment now.  
“I’d love that too,” he said, as his cheeks got pink once more. “And yes, I do love you. Quite a lot.”


End file.
